After the defeat – Southend’s first reversal by Portsmouth since 1996 – Brown discussed the performance, the penalty decision and subsequent miss along with Michael Turner’s league debut.

On the performance against Portsmouth…

Overall we didn’t do enough in the final third, overall not good enough, overall we think we’re better than what we are. We need a reality check, quite a few of them, and that reality check will come by not playing for us, it’s as simple as that.

I was disappointed the fact that we didn’t go 1-0 up. Fair enough, we missed a penalty; was it a penalty? I don’t know. But [we were] playing well enough in the first half to go ahead in the game.

Having said that, we didn’t stop crosses coming into our box and eventually, if you don’t stop crosses you’ll pay for it and we did. First-half compared to the second half, we didn’t have enough quality in the second half, we had plenty in the first half but we didn’t put the ball in the back of the net.

On the penalty award…

It looked like a great save on the line, but it happens so quickly I couldn’t see whether it was the first block or the second block that he’s given the handball for. If he gives a handball for making a save going towards the goal, it’s a sending off offence.

If the referee’s brave enough and the linesman’s brave enough to give a penalty in front of 18,000 screaming fans, then well played, but you’ve got to follow it up and give the red card.

He doesn’t give a red card, he doesn’t give a card. If it is a penalty, if it is a handball, if it is stopping or denying a goal-scoring opportunity, then it’s a sending off offence.

And on the penalty miss…

What happened after that is comical as far as I’m concerned. Three or four lads fighting over the ball, which is a great sign, but the one who takes it doesn’t convert.

I had to calm the half-time down because everyone was concentrating on who’s taking the next penalty; get the next penalty first.

The game was about going in front, as they proved; they went 1-0 up and seen the game out. We go 1-0 up, half this crowd go home and you keep them quiet. We didn’t do our job properly today.

On Michael Turner’s debut…

It was Michael Turner I was worried about [getting injured] more than anybody else but he got through it. Got through the 90-minutes unscathed and hopefully, that’ll see him through for the rest of the season.

Michael’s a good lad, he’s a good man to have around. He’s a giant on the pitch. I’m not asking him to play weird and wonderful football, I’m asking him to defend properly, which one or two of us didn’t do today and got mixed up in playing the weird and wonderful football.